In the years leading up to the British Emancipation Act of 1833, this painting of an enslaved man constituted a timely abolitionist appeal. Set against a deeply shadowed background, the figure’s upward gaze suggests a yearning for freedom as he sits manacled to a bench. The composition echoes conventional imagery of Christian saints and martyrs; artist John Philip Simpson used familiar iconography to appeal to the sentimentality of wealthy white viewers with the requisite power to sway public policy.
But the deeply moving pose also reflects the artistic contribution of the man who modeled for the figure, now identified as Ira Aldridge, a freeborn American actor famous for playing the title role in Shakespeare’s Othello. His performance in Thomas Morton’s musical drama The Slave may have been the immediate inspiration for Simpson’s painting. Aldridge was also renowned for his impassioned speeches for the abolitionist cause.
In 1827, when The Captive Slave was first exhibited at the Royal Academy of Arts in London, the accompanying catalogue included the following excerpt from William Cowper’s 1782 antislavery poem, “Charity”: “But ah! what wish can prosper, or what prayer, / For merchants rich in cargoes of despair.”
An engraving of this work, published by Edward Finden in 1827, is also in the Art Institute’s collection.
Text: Art Institute of Chicago, CC BY 4.0.
